On a Pale Horse

On a Pale Horse

On a Pale Horse (notes)

I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death, and Hades was following close behind him. They were given power over a fourth of the Earth to kill by sword, famine and plague, and by the wild beast of the Earth. – Revelations 6:8

(It used to be that death would come riding in a pale horse, now it’s just as likely that death may come riding on an asteroid, tidal wave, deadly virus or colliding sub atomic particles.)

We are hanging on by a thread here folks. We are hanging on waiting for our miserable little lives to be snuffed out. And it could happen. It could happen at any moment. But then again, what else is new? Every day Mr Death is near. He is lurking around every corner, every bend. To some he is an enemy. To some he is a friend. But he claims all in the end.

Even now he is standing behind you looking over your right shoulder holding his balance scales and rubbing his chin and thinking “is it time yet?”

Death used to be so simple. You died by the sword, plague, or wild beast. And sometimes God would smote a city or two or strike down a non-pious man. But now, now death has become more sophisticated, more technological. Created by our own hands. And I’m not just talking about Mr Oppenhiemer’s deadly toy. That was so last century.

We are creating robots that may someday be the death of us all. At least that’s what Ted K. thought. Scientist predict that robots will reach ‘human equivalence’ by ….

And if the big robots don’t get us, then the nanobots will. Scientist are racing to build atomic sized robots. The plan is to inject in the body to help fight deadly diseases. The side effect, however, is these tiny little buggers can spill onto the ground and start replicating every thing in their path eventually turning the earth into one big pile of grey nano goo.

Mother Nature has a few tricks of her own and can pull the plug at any moment.

Natural Disaster World Tour

Toba Tuff….

Tidal wave….

Asteroid…..

Carp diem. Live life to the fulliest. Don’t put off until tomorrow what you can do today and the other banal expressions mean more now than ever before.

I don’t think we realise on a day to day basis how close the earth comes to being total destroyed or having our civilization destroyed as we know it. Brian Appleyard revealed 10 of the most likely earth destroying catastrophes. All I can say is make sure you have your wills up to date.

This is why we should live life to its fullest. You just never know when it can all blow up. The bushido warriors had the right concept. They believed that you should do everything as if it were the last time you were going to do it. So when you kiss your wife good bye in the morning, you should kiss her like it was the last time you were never going to see her again.

Don’t ‘just do it,’ as Nike proclaimed. Instead ‘do it with passion.’

The top 7 catastrophes

1. A couple of physicist from Long Island get drunk one night an start blasting sub atomic particles with the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider and accidentally create a tiny black hole on Long Island which eventually will slowly suck the Earth’s matter into itself.

2. Linda Hamilton wasn’t crazy after all, the machines do take over the world. Some of our leading technocrats believe that machines will reach “human equivalence” by the year 2030. [get some quotes from Ray Kurzweil’s book, The Age of Spiritual Machines.]

3. If the big machines fail to win the revolution, then the nanobots will. Apparently these microscopic robots the size of an atom may decide to turn the Earth into a filthy grey matter of nanobot goo by transforming everything come into contact with into themselves.

4. It’s not just the high tech stuff standing in the wings to wipe us out. There is the biological weapon wielding terrorist who might decide to unleash microscopic hell on Earth in the form of a deadly virus that we have no immediate cure for.

5. Of course the Earth could decide its had enough of us parasitic humans and unleash some of its own fury. Young Toba Tuff could erupt again. The last time it did, 75, 000 years ago, it released enough ash to cover the entire U.S. and blocked out the sun for years.

6. In then there is the traditional earthquake. All we need is for Kobe to get rocked again with a earthquake measuring 8 or more on the Richter scale to send the world economic markets into freefall. [get some quotes from Bill McGuire’s book, The End of the World: Everything You Never Wanted to Know.]

7. It was a 10km sized asteroid that is said to caused the earth to cleaned of the dinosaurs. All it takes is a an asteroid of 1km or greater to collide with the Earth and cause global destruction. And guess what folks, there are over 1500 1km or more in size asteroids that cross the Earth’s orbit. Asteroid XFll was on target to destroy the Earth in 2020. But scientist have revised their estimates and are saying that the XF11 will miss us by about 1km. What if they are wrong. Remember it was a simple mathematical error that caused the $125 million dollar Mars Climate Orbiter to crash into Martian soil. They were off by 60 miles!